And what if court or castle vaunt

Its children loftier born?.

Who heeds the silken tassel's flaunt
Beside the golden corn?

They ask not for the dainty toil

Of ribboned knights and earls,

The daughters of the virgin soil,
Our freeborn Yankee girls!

By every hill whose stately pines
Wave their dark arms above

The home where some fair being shines,
To warm the wilds with love,
From barest rock to bleakest shore

Where farthest sail unfurls,

That stars and stripes are streaming o'er, — God bless our Yankee girls!

LA GRISETTE.

Ан Clemence! when I saw thee last
Trip down the Rue de Seine,
And turning, when thy form had past,
I said, "We meet again,"

I dreamed not in that idle glance
Thy latest image came,

And only left to memory's trance

A shadow and a name.

The few strange words my lips had taught
Thy timid voice to speak,

Their gentler signs, which often brought
Fresh roses to thy cheek,
The trailing of thy long loose hair

Bent o'er my couch of pain,

All, all returned, more sweet, more fair;

O had we met again!

I walked where saint and virgin keep
The vigil lights of Heaven,

I knew that thou hadst woes to weep,
And sins to be forgiven ;

I watched where Genevieve was laid,
I knelt by Mary's shrine,
Beside me low, soft voices prayed;
Alas! but where was thine?

And when the morning sun was bright,
When wind and wave were calm,
And flamed, in thousand-tinted light,
The rose of Notre Dame,

I wandered through the haunts of men,
From Boulevard to Quai,

Till, frowning o'er Saint Etienne,
The Pantheon's shadow lay.

In vain, in vain; we meet no more,
Nor dream what fates befall;

And long upon the stranger's shore
My voice on thee may call,
When years have clothed the line in moss,

That tells thy name and days,

And withered, on thy simple cross,

The wreaths of Père-la-Chaise !

AN EVENING THOUGHT.

WRITTEN AT SEA.

If sometimes in the dark blue eye,
Or in the deep red wine,
Or soothed by gentlest melody,

Still warms this heart of mine,

Yet something colder in the blood,

And calmer in the brain,

Have whispered that my youth's bright flood Ebbs, not to flow again.

If by Helvetia's azure lake,

Or Arno's yellow stream,

Each star of memory could awake,

As in my first young dream,
I know that when mine eye shall greet

The hill-sides bleak and bare,

That gird my home, it will not meet

My childhood's sunsets there.

O when love's first, sweet, stolen kiss
Burned on my boyish brow,

Was that young forehead worn as this?
Was that flushed cheek as now?

Were that wild pulse and throbbing heart Like these, which vainly strive,

In thankless strains of soulless art,

To dream themselves alive?

Alas! the morning dew is gone,
Gone ere the full of day;

Life's iron fetter still is on,

Its wreaths all torn away;

Happy if still some casual hour

Can warm the fading shrine,

Too soon to chill beyond the power
Of love, or song, or wine!